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UN Agency's Leaked Playbook: Panic, Chaos over Anti-Internet Treaty

The International Telecommunications Union, the UN agency at the center of a firestorm over new efforts to regulate the Internet, is preparing a social media campaign to target what it expects will be fierce opposition to a revised telephone treaty being decided next month at a secret conference in Dubai.

That’s according to a key ITU internal planning document that appeared Saturday on the website WCITLeaks, which has been posting a steady stream of documents leading up to the conference. Even as ITU officials accelerate increasingly clumsy efforts to deflect the wrath of Internet users over next month’s World Conference on International Telecommunications, more documents leaking out ahead of the meeting continue to expose the agency’s misstatements.

The WCIT conference will consider revisions to a 1988 treaty known as the International Telecommunications Regulations. At the meeting, 193 member nations consider dozens of proposed amendments, including several that would bring the Internet under ITU jurisdiction and substantially change the architecture and governance of the Internet. Other proposals would, if adopted, give countries including Russia, China, and Iran UN sanctioned-authority to monitor and censor incoming and outgoing Internet traffic under the guise of improving “security.”

The newly-leaked document is the agenda for an “ITU Senior Management Retreat” held in Geneva in September. It includes a detailed report on resistance to WCIT and the agency’s plans to counter criticism of its secretive processes. It also includes links and passwords for presentations given by outside public relations and advertising executives from leading global agencies. (The passwords were still active as of Nov. 24th.)

The document, marked “confidential,” suggests senior ITU officials have become both paranoid and panicked over growing outrage over both the form and substance of the upcoming negotiations. Material included with the agenda paints a pathetic picture of the150 year-old UN agency struggling to defend itself from attacks by what the agency believes is a “well-financed and well-organized campaign originating in the USA” whose goal is to “discredit the ITU and WCIT.”

The two-day meeting also featured leading media consultants invited to help the agency formulate a strategy to avoid the kind of global outrage that mortally wounded a secret Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement treaty earlier this year, and which did in copyright legislation known as SOPA and PIPA in the U.S. in January.

Both ACTA and the US copyright bills were widely expected to pass with little opposition until Internet users organized physical and virtual protests that caught lawmakers by surprise.

According to the internal ITU document, the agency had already launched what it calls a “counter-campaign”–a media blitz the agency plans to expand in light of what the ITU sees as the likely event of significant hostility to the revised treaty after the conference.

Following the WCIT meeting, the ITU says, the counter-campaign will focus on ways to “mitigate the risk” of an “intensive anti-ratification campaign in [the US and Western Europe], based on the so-called lack of openness of the WCIT process, resulting in a significant number of countries refusing to ratify the new ITRs.”

A Crisis of the ITU’s Own Making

The “so-called lack of openness” has little to do with growing outrage over WCIT. The real objections to the conference have more to do with substance than the secrecy of the negotiations. First and foremost, there is strong opposition within the US and EU delegations to expanding the UN’s jurisdiction over IP networks in any form. (The current ITRs do not extend to the Internet.)

Globally, concern is also growing over increasingly direct efforts by some national governments to hijack the conference into mandating changes to the engineering-driven, multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance that relies on non-governmental international organizations such as the Internet Society, ICANN, and the W3C. These changes are seen as preludes to future restrictions on content and users implemented through the reengineering of key resources.

Also last week, Google launched its own campaign, urging users to take direct action against the WCIT. “Some governments want to use a closed-door meeting in December to increase censorship and regulate the Internet,” the company said. “Some proposals could permit governments to censor legitimate speech — or even allow them to cut off Internet access.”

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These repulsive parasites are nothing but power whores and power whoring is the sole reason they are pursuing this. These guys simply want a death grip on your data access. They technically ignorant and easily start fear mongering about cyber terrorism. Guess what? we don’t need a bunch of power mongering yet frightened girl scouts to keep our internet secure. Public tar and featuring is far too good for these Luddite miscreants!

Dear Larry, maybe it is normal practice these days to write repeatedly about a particular organization or process without consulting the opinion of said organization but if so, this is indeed a pity. The document you refer to is one of dozens of input documents to internal discussion and scenario planning and is therefore completely out of context which has caused your imagination to run riot. For instance, the ‘media experts’ you referred to were not invited to discuss WCIT at all but as part of advice for our overall longer term digital communication – a normal internal discussion that is happening in many organizations every day, including Forbes. You seem also determined to keep repeating the absolute myth that UN seeks control of the Internet – you decide not to quote the parts of our blog posts which would prove that nothing that comes out of WCIT will give the ITU any (never mind ‘more’) control over the Internet. Regulation happens at the national level and ITU’s treaty-making conference will not change that. You can chose not to listen and to slag off the ITU as being irrelevant but post-WCIT will prove that all your fears were but ill-informed scaremongering. I am looking forward to reading you in 2013 to see if your reporting is more informed and enlightened. If you ever want to go to the trouble of fact-checking your wildly inaccurate reports do not hesitate to call.

I would be delighted to publish intact any reply or correction the ITU cares to make to this or any other post. Every relevant fact in this and other articles was of course hyperlinked back to the source, but perhaps the ITU’s social media training has not yet reached the topic of hyperlinks.

Unfortunately I am not a reporter or a journalist, I am a policy analyst, columnist and blogger. According to to the posted media credentials requirements for the ITU, I am therefore not welcome to participate in the organization’s media briefings or meetings.

You are most welcome to join our briefings – indeed we had one recently which was immediately archived on our online WCIT newsroom (http://www.itu.int/en/wcit-12/Pages/newsroom.aspx) and which was open to all media and other interested parties including civil society, non-members from private sector, and analysts etc. I understand hyperlinking ettiquette and as a former journalist I can assure you that not everything online is a fact; always best to cross check with the source (or object) otherwise it is unnecessarily subjective and selective. BTW – we will also have daily online briefings from Dubai which anyone can follow.

By “all media” welcome to participate in your “briefings” I assume you mean all media that can satisfy your 19th century Media Accreditation Procedure (http://www.itu.int/en/wcit-12/Pages/media-accreditation.aspx)?

Of course policy analysts like me who don’t qualify but who certainly don’t want to let their “imagination to run riot” and have to rely on whatever information leaks out of the ITU’s fortresss taken “completely out of context” would be more likely to behave in accordance with your preferences if your organization actually made public even one, let alone the “dozens of input documents to internal discussion and scenario planning” that you now admit exist behind the firewall. Since you claim the process has been “completely transparent,” then you’ll no doubt be willing to make available all of those documents, as well as all of the proposals that WCIT has generated? That would be the obvious way to dispel any “myths,” rather than simply repeating the same carefully-worded obfuscations in your blog posts.

Speaking of which, can you start by explaining the statement made most recently in a blog post under your name on Nov. 15th (http://itu4u.wordpress.com/2012/11/15/wcit-12-clarification-needed-during-open-letter-season/) that “there have not been any proposals calling for a change from the bottom-up multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance to an ITU-controlled model”? For those of us with wild imaginations and no access to the dozens of proposals and input documents you mention, that would seem to contradict Section 3A proposed by the Russian Federation (both the Nov. 13th version you had when you wrote your post and the revision that followed it) as well as the statement from Dr. Toure to BNA Bloomberg back in September that some “preliminary proposals” did in fact deal with Internet governance as Dr. Toure himself specifically and narrowly defines it?

Information is no doubt taken out of context when an important event that could affect future development of the Internet economy is closed to review or participation from the billions of people who rely on it. Perhaps if you provided “context” the ITU wouldn’t feel so threatened by the “paranoid” response that any “former journalist” worth his salt could have easily predicted. Who else after all, is going to “inform” and “enlighten” us about what the ITU is doing, given that the ITU has not?

Still waiting for any and all corrections to my “wildly inaccurate” reports. I made the same offer to ETNO months ago, but they didn’t respond either.

Dear Larry – ‘all media’ for our accreditation which you consider 19th century – includes both online media and bloggers (neither of which were around in the 19th century as far as I know and you are a blogger according to your own description), so again you seem to see what you want to see. The accreditation is in fact very open and flexible so that is not an excuse you can hide behind.

Regarding the internal documents that we draft internally, these comprise of different plans, strategies, analysis etc. Again, normal best-practice for any business and most organizations do not share these for multiple reasons. Do we have the Google campaign strategy document for instance? Or Forbes business plan? There is nothing unusual or sinister in this. The ‘leaked’ document that you refer to (first clarification – it was not leaked as this would imply a deliberate distribution from an ITU staffer when in fact it was uploaded without authorization from an ITU server and distributed externally without permission) is an input document, not to the conference, but to the coordination team here at the Secretariat that is tasked with running the conference as efficiently as possible which includes understanding possible scenarios so we can be prepared to support accordingly. Neither is it the ‘Playbook’ and neither does it constitute anything resembling panic or chaos.

I should also add that we have not launched a social media campaign (unlike others such as Google or Access Now). We have a modest social media presence which is not the same thing as a campaign and which again is simply normal communication practice for any organization today. Neither are we employing a communications agency – we are in fact a few people in a relatively small team in a Secretariat. You can come visit and find out for yourself if you like.

Regarding the contentious Russian proposal (for which there are many counter proposals also) I do not want to interpret texts as this is certainly not the mandate of the ITU Secretariat. However, I have not found where it explicitly says that ITU should take control. Even if this can somehow be interpreted it is physically and legally impossible and simply will not happen. Additionally, ITU Secretary General is on the record (most recently at the Internet Governance Forum in Baku) as fully supporting ICANN’s role and has stated his intention to ensure future collaboration with the new ICANN CEO.

Finally Larry, the ITU Secretary General has urged ITU members on many occasions to make all the documents available (see for instance his speech to ITU Council last July). ITU Council (made up of its members) decided to release the TD64 which provided the best overview. Note that all members (including Internet Society for instance) have access to all documents and can share these with whom and however they wish. Additionally, anyone can request from their national administrations for documents (including you) and they will be provided. ITU is a member-driven organization and this is the system that is in place, and while it may not be perfect it is certainly not closed as you depict.

As regards, who else is going to inform and enlighten us about what the ITU is doing? Thankfully, there is no shortage of good objective reporting still out there. You may want to check out Wired, Financial Times, International Herald Tribune, BBC, Le Monde, Toronto Star and many others that continue to report in a balanced manner.

The ITU, gentle readers, has operated largely in obscurity for the last 150 plus years. Exposed to sunlight, we see in full the mindset of the UN bureaucracy, used to lecturing on what they wish were the facts but which are not, and used to diplomats who nod in agreement in a kind of gentleman’s club of tacit cognitive dissonance. Embedded in the comments above is all one needs to know about why expanding the ITU’s role beyond traditional areas of mature technologies in any respect would be, to put it mildly, a bad idea.

1. On the ITU’s Media Accreditation Procedure (which again can be found here: http://www.itu.int/en/wcit-12/Pages/media-accreditation.aspx), readers are welcome to read it for themselves. (It’s not secret.) For example, to qualify as an “online media” journalist, the applicant must be someone “generating at least once a week a substantial amount of original news content or analysis that extends beyond personal diaries, forums and external links. The site should be registered to a media organization with a verifiable non-web address and telephone number.”

You will note that all forms of media accreditation assume there is a print publication of some kind behind the work the media applicant does, you know, like in 1865.

As for bloggers, here is specifically what the ITU says:

“Bloggers may be granted accreditation if blog content is deemed relevant to the industry, contains news commentary, is regularly updated and made publicly available. Corporate blogs are not eligible for accreditation. Analysts may be eligible for accreditation providing they:

follow the telecommunications/ICT market; are currently employed as an industry analyst by an internationally recognized analyst house; report in one of the publications issued by the analyst house. Reports must be generally available to the public. Analysts working on reports that are circulated internally or to a select group of clients, are not eligible for ITU accreditation.”

Perhaps this is just poor drafting and formatting. Perhaps the ITU means that the boldface “bloggers” that begins the paragraph is separate from “analysts” who must have print credentials described in the same paragraph. In any case, saying that bloggers “may be” deemed creditable if their content is “deemed” relevant is hardly an “open” invitation. But one can fill out the “the entire form” and wait for a response, I suppose.

2. What evidence does Mr. Conneally have to share with us that the leaked planning document was “uploaded without authorization from an ITU server,” and if that is how the document made it to the WCITLeaks site what does the agency’s lax computer security tell us about the agency’s ability to assume more leadership in helping establish or even coordinate Internet security for others?

3. The word “campaign” and even “counter-campaign” appears frequently in the leaked document, as readers can see for themselves. For example, in noting the possibility that Internet users may petition their governments not to ratify a “substantially” revised treaty, the document says, “There is a risk of ["the so-called ACTA scenario"] will happen, but our communications campaign can mitigate this.” Also, “The ITU Secretariat has initiated a counter-campaign, which has been fairly successful outside the US and even in the US: some of the statements made to denigrate the ITU and WCIT are so extreme that they were easy to challenge and rebut.”

4. Mr. Conneally writes: “Regarding the contentious Russian proposal (for which there are many counter proposals also) I do not want to interpret texts as this is certainly not the mandate of the ITU Secretariat.” But of course he and his colleagues, including the Secretary-General, have been “interpreting texts” all along, in interviews, op-eds and ITU posts I quote and link to where they have maintained, variously, that there have been no proposals for a new section of the treaty on “the Internet,” that no proposals call for changes to Internet governance or, as the agency now hedges, no proposals to change Internet governance in a way that makes “explicit” that “the ITU should take control.” That is certainly interpreting the texts–texts they have not made available to those they are reassuring of their interpretations.

Even after having the Russian proposal in hand, indeed, Mr. Conneally and another ITU spokesperson continued to maintain that, as Mr. Conneally wrote, “there have not been any proposals calling for a change from the bottom-up multi-stakeholder model of Internet governance to an ITU-controlled model.” (“have not” was underlined). Another ITU spokesperson told The Hill, again after the Russian proposal was submitted: “There’s nothing that’s coming up in this conference that touches on Internet governance or proposes changing the current mandate of the organizations that run the Internet.” Etc.

But here is some actual text from the Russian proposal, at least the version in hand at the time: “Member States shall have the sovereign right to manage the Internet within their national territory, as well as to manage national Internet domain names.” And “Member States shall have equal rights in the international allocation of Internet addressing and identification resources.” These treaty terms, if adopted, would dramatically change the current model of Internet governance, and cannot be squared with the ITU’s continuing reassurances that Internet governance hasn’t even been mentioned in “any proposals.”

What role the ITU itself would play in the implementation or oversight of these proposals, if accepted, isn’t explicit because the treaty already has provisions dealing with the ITU’s own role in the ITRs, some of which is also open for revision at the conference. But then, I never said that any proposal made “explicit” (or implicit) that the “ITU should take control.” What I actually wrote was, “a leaked November 13th proposal from the Russian Federation to the ITU specifically adds a new section to the treaty dealing with Internet governance, and would if adopted transfer some it not all of ICANN’s authority over domain names, Internet addresses and other key resources to national governments under the auspices of the ITU.”

4. I never suggested that the ITU’s Secretary-General didn’t try (and fail) to get permission to make the full set of conference documents public. What I’ve said is that they have not done so, and that hiding behind their members as the reason may be good policy but is anything but “completely transparent.” I could be wrong about that.

5. I’ve provided whatever information I can based on leaked documents to support the view that the ITU is panicking and is responding chaotically to the entirely reasonable concerns of Internet users worldwide that a conference that could profoundly affect the future of an ecosystem they rely on ought to be sharing its proposals with the public. Readers can judge for themselves whether that characterization is or is not supported by the linked references and quotations I provide.

That seems enough for now. But just curious, Mr. Conneally, as long as you are being “completely transparent”, can you confirm whether or not the ITU requested or in any way encouraged Wired to change the title of Dr. Toure’s recent op-ed from its original title, “UN Must Regulate the Internet” to the revised title, a few days later, “UN: We Seek to Bring Internet to All.”? And do you have any information that would explain why Wired, which you say is covering WCIT in a “balanced manner,” didn’t note or explain such a significant change made after publication?

Larry Downes has it absolutely right. There are ITU folk here who are paid to troll, dropping the falsehood on thick like layers of an onion. Firstly, #Anonymous has fully debunked the ITU’s false claims of having valid participation system that is open, it is in fact closed, and never was valid, a frank assessment of it is available here: http://t.co/eQ1ljfi0 It was the Netherlands member state contributors who began to raise concerns about the ITU process and its potential “indirect effects” on Tor and other software on June 8, 2012. This document (which at the time was public) was quickly released on 6/15 http://www.scribd.com/doc/97227743/t09-Cwg-wcit12-Inf-0016msw-e but we then noticed that the ITU began “locking down” this and other documents on its site. We have also noticed that the Russian Federation is proposing a law to outlaw Tor software while at the same time, chairing the ITU / WCIT using Dr. Alexander Kushtuev, who is the ‘Rostelecom’ representative in Switzerland and Chair of the WCIT Management team. For further reference, please see https://twitter.com/AnonyOps/status/270611160989044737 These observations validate the earlier concerns that were apparently raised by the Netherlands member state. The ITU WCIT12 is clearly being used as an internet censorship and control convention, particularly for states that will take concurrences reached there back to their home countries to develop further restrictive censorship home laws as they act in reliance upon the ITU in this regard.

Another though on the business of tolls – you know that cost is going to be passed on to the end user – even though supposedly they are already paying a fee substantial enough to allow their ISP to make a profit. Additionally Telcos would seemingly love this model as it would allow them to treat IP traffic on everything the same way they do on mobile networks – charge by the GB of data transfer after a small amount included in their plan and soak the end user on any overage.

Indeed, it is difficult for technocratic organisations to get scrutinized in public debates, but that provides also a great opportunity for institutional reform and opening of the geriatric procedures. Mind that the ITU is older than the UN.